Sports and Storytelling: Captivating Audiences with Virtual Feeds.

Have you ever tried to explain the rules of Cricket to someone who has never played the game? Golf's scoring system or the offside rule? The laws of sports can be complicated, but they are crucial to playing, understanding and, as a viewer, enjoying the action.

One of my favourite memories from my early twenties was when I walked into a bar in Cape Cod and saw baseball being broadcast on the TV screens. I asked my companion, a fellow Brit living in the US, to help me understand the rules and stats on the graphics. Others at the bar, including the bartender, overheard my question, and soon, six or seven of us watched the game and drank beer together. My new drinking buddies introduced and explained the rules, stats, and players to me, and what started as a quiet beer turned into a fun couple of hours with local sports fans. Since then, I have enjoyed watching baseball.

Throughout my career covering Sports, I have had countless requests to explain the rules, and because I am an avid sports TV viewer, my family would ask me to describe the rules as we watched a game together. I noticed that if they didn't grasp the rules quickly, their attention and interest switched off and turned to other things. So, the lack of understanding and inability to engage with the action immediately makes people lose interest or switch over, not the duration of a particular event.

The perception is that those under 35 have reduced patience and attention deficit with so many digital alternatives. Yet this group will happily watch a 2-hour movie, binge on Box sets, spend hours in front of a screen gaming, or on social media, etc. They are drawn to the digital screen as their primary source of entertainment but must be engaged immediately to remain for the duration of the content. As professional storytellers, when viewers used to flick through multiple TV channels, we were told that you had 5 seconds to make an impression on the viewer; now, in this digital age, it is probably 2!

To keep pace, sports events offer shorter highlights and features, also known as 'snackable content'. These shorter forms of content are designed to grab the viewer's attention and keep them engaged for a brief period; however, by doing so, they are giving the viewer the option not to watch the live event and, instead, allow them to search for the shortest form of content available. The live event remains the most entertaining experience. Nothing compares to watching the drama of sports unfold in real time. In addition, regardless of the platform, the viewing audience for the live broadcast is a critical financial metric to attract sponsors and partners. Therefore, it is crucial to drive viewers to the live broadcast or stream and keep them engaged. Virtual production is a valuable tool for achieving this. It provides an alternative viewing option to the more traditional broadcast. It gives content creators and storytellers a range of creative possibilities to tell the story in an alternative yet visually appealing way for a particular demographic.

I watched the main feed of the Super Bowl this year live. The next day, I watched clips from the Nickelodeon feed. It was a terrific production that used cartoon characters and loads of animation to explain the action in a fun and engaging way. The commentary was excellent and authentic, but the cartoon characters could ask questions as a child would, and the commentators answered those. This feed was a superb viewing option for a sports fan with a young family to watch a major event together and have the screen, supported by well-known characters, explain the action with entertaining visual additions instead of everyone relying on the fan. The Super Bowl is a national event that draws in a massive TV audience and a host of A-list celebrities, which makes it fun for the non-sports fan. This year, the Taylor/Travis story was a perfect backdrop. Taylor Swift has undoubtedly added to the number of younger viewers and women watching, and for that new audience to be offered the Nickelodeon feed as a viewing choice to introduce them to the NFL and American football as a sport was a terrific option. They saw the same action and celebrity cutaways that we provided on the main CBS feed; it's just that the graphics and other animations were different.

It is essential to continue distributing the main broadcast feed for the dedicated, passionate and knowledgeable sports fans, and sports have served this audience by providing additional feeds for many years, mainly with enhanced data. Their attempts to engage a younger audience have seen partnerships with companies like Roblox that create animated characters from the live-action. Still, whilst these are good initiatives, the animation is too far removed from the main action, so the dedicated sports fan would lose their interest because they don't want to watch an animation of the main event instead of the real thing. Watching sports together as a family or with friends is another integral part of its enjoyment, like going to the movies or theatre. Virtual production blends the requirements of new fans without damaging the event's authenticity for dedicated sports viewers.

Five years ago, creating a separate virtual feed would have been difficult. However, the technological advancements in digital distribution have made it more accessible and cost-effective. For the production, the improvements in camera tracking, AI keying, and graphic design, mainly using Epic's Unreal Engine, have sped up and simplified the process. Adding some aspects to the existing broadcast and production set-up is an additional cost. Still, attracting new fans, particularly younger and more feminine audiences, is an investment. In addition, this separate feed and different audiences provide an opportunity to partner with new brands and sponsors separate from those that support the main, traditional broadcast.

Sports federations, leagues, and broadcasters need to consider exploring the implementation of a separate virtual production feed to attract new fans. In addition to a visually appealing explainer feed of their sport, they can edit the action and animations into more snackable content pre and post-event to continue engagement and for promotional and marketing purposes. Many events would benefit from such a feed. World, Regional and domestic cup finals, Grand slams, Playoffs, Grand finals and major tournaments and races. All of them create international or national interest and, as a result, attract a more extensive, non-sport audience, presenting a terrific opportunity to tap into a nascent market of new fans and start them on their journey to dedicated fans.

The best way to learn any sport is by playing or participating. However, participation numbers have been declining while digital consumption has increased. Therefore, using digital innovations, such as virtual production, to explain the rules and regulations of sports might help increase participation levels. From a digital perspective, the younger generation is just as willing to engage as previous generations. The difference is that they have so many options available, which allows them to be selective and make quick decisions. They will always be more comfortable watching something they can understand and become interested in. For sports, with its complex rules, using visual stimuli that grab their attention over a 1–2 to two-hour period must be offered, along with explanations of the action and introductions to the leading players and performers. With high-quality animation, authentic commentary, and clever graphics delivered as a separate feed, virtual production provides sports an exciting digital opportunity to educate, inform, and entertain new fans.

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